Over the years I've collected my fair share of basses (old, new, expensive and not so expensive) and recently I went through and sold them all, for the exception of my ol' trusty '04 MIM Jazz.
It was given to me on christmas of that year by my father. This was my first REAL bass. I had a wal-mart first act bass as a starter bass and then a 1984 charvel beater for the first 2 years of playing bass. I got this sexy black jazz and I never stopped playing it for about 4 years. It had its share of slight modifications to it, starting with changing the pickguard from the boring stock white to a red tort. Next came the badass II bridge some months later. A few months after that the pickups in the bass died and had to be replaced, so I had to sit for a week with no bass to play. I ordered some Custom Shop 60's Jazz pickups online. When the new pickups arrived, i shielded it and installed the pickups and i was back in business. these new pickups were amazing and had just the sound i was looking for.
The bass stayed that way for the next few years. Fast forward to last week, when I decided I needed something to do because my pots were getting scratchy and cutting out no matter how much deoxid i'd put in there.. They were pretty poor quality pots to begin with anyway and I had the parts laying around. I changed out the old pots with CTS 250k and put a sprague .047uf orange drop cap on the tone circuit. One big reason why I did this too, was when I originally changed out the pickups, I wasn't that great of a solderer and the joints were REALLY ugly and poorly done. HUGE difference and improvement in tone. I was ecstatic.
I began playing some more and discovered that my A string was lacking in tension and it was hopping out of the nut a little, and was really high on the string post. I bought a Hipshot 3 string retainer. Not only does it look good, it improves the feel of the bass very nicely. I was also looking here on TB and I saw the Neck screw inserts and I got some and installed them. Night and day difference. This bass is kicking some serious ass. It feels great, sounds amazing and looks sexy of course.
Now comes the final piece, the new pickups.
I was looking for a different sound to whet my pallette and I've always wanted to try out some Lindy Fralin jazz pickups. I've always heard some great things but never actually tried them. So i found a pair of Split J lindys here on TB, bought them, and installed them today... Now, Im not a connoisseur for pickups, but these $200 pickups just don't sound quite as good as my $100 fender CS60's pickups. Now, I know they've only been in my bass for one day, whereas my other pickups have about 5 more years than that in that jazz, but I thought i'd be getting more than what I got, but only time will tell.
All in all, i think i've modded this bass as far as it'll ever need to go. I'll take the pepsi challenge any day with any american fender and this one will blow it out of the water in every way.
EDIT: Here are some pics finally. My camera is MIA due to moving right now, but here are some cellphone pics.
Im gonna try to do something about that hole from where the original string retainer was.
A little F logo neckplate and Rush love
What're your thoughts?
It was given to me on christmas of that year by my father. This was my first REAL bass. I had a wal-mart first act bass as a starter bass and then a 1984 charvel beater for the first 2 years of playing bass. I got this sexy black jazz and I never stopped playing it for about 4 years. It had its share of slight modifications to it, starting with changing the pickguard from the boring stock white to a red tort. Next came the badass II bridge some months later. A few months after that the pickups in the bass died and had to be replaced, so I had to sit for a week with no bass to play. I ordered some Custom Shop 60's Jazz pickups online. When the new pickups arrived, i shielded it and installed the pickups and i was back in business. these new pickups were amazing and had just the sound i was looking for.
The bass stayed that way for the next few years. Fast forward to last week, when I decided I needed something to do because my pots were getting scratchy and cutting out no matter how much deoxid i'd put in there.. They were pretty poor quality pots to begin with anyway and I had the parts laying around. I changed out the old pots with CTS 250k and put a sprague .047uf orange drop cap on the tone circuit. One big reason why I did this too, was when I originally changed out the pickups, I wasn't that great of a solderer and the joints were REALLY ugly and poorly done. HUGE difference and improvement in tone. I was ecstatic.
I began playing some more and discovered that my A string was lacking in tension and it was hopping out of the nut a little, and was really high on the string post. I bought a Hipshot 3 string retainer. Not only does it look good, it improves the feel of the bass very nicely. I was also looking here on TB and I saw the Neck screw inserts and I got some and installed them. Night and day difference. This bass is kicking some serious ass. It feels great, sounds amazing and looks sexy of course.
Now comes the final piece, the new pickups.
I was looking for a different sound to whet my pallette and I've always wanted to try out some Lindy Fralin jazz pickups. I've always heard some great things but never actually tried them. So i found a pair of Split J lindys here on TB, bought them, and installed them today... Now, Im not a connoisseur for pickups, but these $200 pickups just don't sound quite as good as my $100 fender CS60's pickups. Now, I know they've only been in my bass for one day, whereas my other pickups have about 5 more years than that in that jazz, but I thought i'd be getting more than what I got, but only time will tell.
All in all, i think i've modded this bass as far as it'll ever need to go. I'll take the pepsi challenge any day with any american fender and this one will blow it out of the water in every way.
EDIT: Here are some pics finally. My camera is MIA due to moving right now, but here are some cellphone pics.
Im gonna try to do something about that hole from where the original string retainer was.
A little F logo neckplate and Rush love
What're your thoughts?
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